


now i've lost my fear of falling

by aceface



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: M/M, Minor Nick Grimshaw/Harry Styles, Minor Perrie Edwards/Zayn Malik
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-14
Updated: 2014-02-14
Packaged: 2018-01-12 09:15:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,609
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1184495
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aceface/pseuds/aceface
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The point is that no one gives a shit that Louis's absent mindedly shoved a stupid pen in his pocket, until he steps outside and almost gets knocked off his fucking feet by some idiot in a cape. As if anyone still thinks a cape is a good idea, anyway, they've all seen The Incredibles.</p>
            </blockquote>





	now i've lost my fear of falling

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Español available: [now i've lost my fear of falling](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1224799) by [athenasword](https://archiveofourown.org/users/athenasword/pseuds/athenasword)



> This started off as me saying, 'Hey, wouldn't it be hilarious if Liam was a superhero and Louis became a supervillain just to piss him off?'
> 
> 19,000 words later and I think this is the longest fanfic I've ever written. I'm so sorry.
> 
> Warning for minor violence, torture. Nothing too bad but there are more detailed descriptions in the notes at the bottom if needed.
> 
> (thank you to nat and pri for putting up with me during this. couldn't have done it otherwise.)

The thing is, it's definitely not like Louis _means_ to steal it, because if he's going to steal something then it definitely wouldn't be a pen - and especially not one of the shitty little pens from Argos, either. He's got more than enough pens and everyone steals the Argos pens anyway, so much that when the shop alarm things go off, the assistant doesn't even bother to stop him - just waves him through with a tired look on their face. Louis figures he'd probably look like that if he had to work at Argos, too. The novelty of the catalogues wears off pretty sharpish.

The point is that no one gives a shit that Louis's absent mindedly shoved a stupid pen in his pocket, until he steps outside and almost gets knocked off his fucking feet by some idiot in a cape. As if anyone still thinks a cape is a good idea, anyway, they've all seen The Incredibles.

"What the fuck was that?" he says, and scrambles to his feet. These were new chinos, and now there's dirt all over them, as well as mud – because of _course_ it’s raining today. Louis wouldn't usually mind, but this isn't a stupid thing that _he's_ done but that someone else has done _to_ him, so it ramps his annoyance up a few levels. "Twat," he adds, for good measure.

The idiot in a cape looks perturbed, his brows drawing together. "You were stealing," he says, sounding a bit unsure of himself. "You took that pen."

"Oh my _God_ ," Louis says, because it should be against the laws of the universe to be knocked over for forgetting to put a stupid _pen_ back, and it's easy to find it in his pocket and throw it at the idiot. (It's also easy to notice that the lycra looks very good on the idiot, but that's not the point. Not right now, anyway.) "Is that better then, mate? Bit of an overreaction to knock someone to the ground because they forgot to put a pen back."

"It was supposed to be a warning," the idiot admits, twisting his hands in the hem of his cape, "but I overshot a bit. Er. Sorry about that."

"Yes, well, you should be," Louis says, and pulls his hood down further over his face, glaring in the guy’s general direction.

He stares down the idiot some more (although it’d be easier if it wasn’t raining, Louis can barely see anything at all), refusing to be the one who looks away first, until the idiot drops his cape and says, "Right, I'll just be going then. Um. Carry on. But no more stealing." He pauses, as though he wants to say something else, but doesn't quite know what. "Stay in school," he says at last, and tries to fly off.

It doesn't work very well, because Louis's stepped on his cape. He doesn't even try to hide his cackle as the guy disentangles himself and flies off again in a huff.

-

"He shouldn't be allowed to get away with it," Louis says with a huff, sliding into the seat next to Harry - close enough that Harry's curls tickle his face which, on second thoughts, is a bit _too_ close. Today, anyway; Louis isn't in the mood for face-tickles. Not from hair. Not from _anyone_ , actually.

Harry raises an eyebrow but doesn't say anything - wisely so. Niall, on the other hand, has no such compunctions (is that a word? Louis thinks it sounds like a word, but Louis's also on his third pint so he's a bit hazy on those things) and laughs. Loudly.

"Ah, are you still going on about that? Mate, he's one of them heroes, they can do anything, can't they? 'Specially if he's flying around and that."

"It shouldn't be _allowed_ ," Louis insists. "If that's allowed then anything could be, if you just call yourself a hero. I could steal pens and just fly away. I could say it's for the good of the world."

"Except that stopping people from stealing is more for the good of the world than stealing is," Harry points out, unfairly. It's not like anything is logical anymore, not if there are heroes. Which yes, okay, Louis knows that they're a thing - they've just never been a thing in his way before. They've just been up there in the sky, doing superhero stuff. Now they're going around knocking people over and taking Argos pens away from people. Poor, innocent people.

"You _could_ say that I'm a victim in all this," Louis says, ignoring the way Harry says, "Er, not really, you couldn't. I mean, you _could_ , but technically you could say anything. Doesn't make it right."

Louis frowns at this last bit. "When did you get so _boring_?" he asks, then holds up a hand to shush Harry before he can say anything. "No need to tell me, Styles. That was one of them rhetorical questions, because I really don't care. Yes, I maybe accidentally stole a pen _through no fault of my own_ , but he knocked me over, which is escalating the situation. It's violent, is what it is. He's out of control. He needs to be stopped."

"Are you saying that you need to _pen_ him in?" Harry says, and giggles.

"Your puns are dreadful," Louis tells him, but Harry just laughs harder and says, "D'you reckon I've got a _pen_ chant for them?" He looks much too pleased with himself.

"Give it a rest," Niall says unexpectedly, and Louis takes advantage of the betrayed look Harry is giving Niall to say, " _Thank_ you, Niall," before Harry can get started again. "We have bigger problems here. Like this super-idiot. I looked him up on the Internet--"

"You've mentioned that once or twice," Harry says, but he says it under his breath and without any bad jokes, so Louis decides to generously let it go and keep talking.

"And his superhero name is _Flyman_ , which is honestly the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard, it's like he has no imagination. Clearly," Louis says, " _clearly_ , imagination is not one of his super powers."

"And knowing when to shut up isn't yours," Niall says cheerfully, taking another long swallow of his beer. Louis remembers the days when Niall thought every word out of Louis's mouth was hilarious. The golden days, if you will. He misses those days.

"I'm going to be a super villain," Louis says loudly, and Harry says, "More like a super vill- _liam_ ," and then, "oops."

Niall is making the least subtle 'shut up' gestures that Louis has ever seen, it's ridiculous. Either way, judging from the way Harry's face has dropped, it means that he wasn't supposed to tell Louis something - and things that Louis isn't supposed to know are usually the best things to know. That's what Louis thinks, anyway.

"I don't get it," Louis says, and stares at Harry, who seems to be doing his best to hide under his curls. It doesn't work, mostly because he started styling his hair in a vague sort of quiff thing a few days ago and hasn't yet realised that he can't just duck his head and pretend he’s invisible anymore. "Explain."

"Um," Harry says, and looks helplessly at Niall. Niall, who just drains his pint and grins at Harry, setting his glass down on the table.

"You're on your own for this one, mate."

"Well, Flyman is called Liam," Harry says, and nods, as though proving a point to himself. "So you're not just being a villain, you're being a vill- _liam_ , right?"

"You _know_ him?" Louis screeches and Niall cackles, seemingly enjoying this - until Louis rounds on him, pointing. "Oh no, Niall, me lad, don't think that you're getting out of this. You both know him? And you just let him fly around looking like that? Calling himself _Flyman_?"

"He didn't like any of my suggestions," Harry says, and shrugs a shoulder, taking a sip of his own drink - some brightly coloured cocktail that makes Louis feel a bit sick just looking at it. Harry is on a mission to try literally every drink served in this place. Some drinks turn out better than others. "But we're not supposed to tell people his identity so, er, if you could pretend you don't know? Thanks."

"I'm a _super villain_ ," Louis says, because he's made the decision and he's going to commit to it. "I'm just going to use his real identity for my villainous ways."

"No, you're not," Niall says, and beams when Louis looks at him. "You don't know his surname, Lou. There are a lot of people called Liam out there, most of them aren't gonna be Flyman."

"I just think that's a really stupid name," Louis says. "And now I'm going to have to brainstorm a really good super villain name and I don't have any ideas and - _no_ , Harry, you're not allowed to help, so there."

"A-niall-ator," Niall says, and dissolves into giggles. Louis's friends are useless.

-

He definitely needs a costume, but it’s a bit tricky when he doesn’t have a name. On the plus side, it only seems to be the heroes who like strutting about in spandex, and villains seem able to do without. Louis’s not necessarily _relieved_ , but it’s not a big revelation for him to admit that he’s not really the spandex/lycra type. Probably he should just wear black clothes instead. Black seems like a villain colour, and he’s probably already got some lying around that he can easily repurpose for his costume.

This is such a lot of effort. Louis really doesn’t know how heroes do it.

The most important bit, as far as Louis can tell – apart from the name, but he’s going to have to come back to that one – is the mask. Liam’s just got one of those domino mask things but that’s stupid; it’s easy to tell what he looks like. And he’s not sure if Liam remembers him from outside Argos, but Louis wants to avoid any possibility of being recognised. Besides, he’d had his hood up because it’d been raining, so it’s entirely likely that Liam doesn’t know what he looks like at all. Louis wants to keep it that way.

(Besides, if he gets caught by one of the other superheroes – well, he doesn’t want to get into any _real_ trouble. It’d be fucking annoying if he did.)

He thinks about going properly old school and putting a stocking over his head, like they did in the comic books or Famous Five or whatever, but it seems like it’d be pretty stupid. In the end, a balaclava seems like the best option, even if it is a bit thuggish – he wants a Spiderman sort of mask, but again, that’s probably more effort than it’s worth. Maybe he can ask for someone to get him one for his birthday when it’s time for an upgrade.

When it’s all put together – black jeans, black jumper, black mask – he looks more like he’s in a gang and about to go on the rob than anything else, but it’s intimidating and villainous enough. Louis feels the part, anyway, and that’s half the battle, innit?

He sends Niall a photo, because he needs to gloat to someone and Niall’s the least likely to laugh at him. Sure enough, his phone rings five seconds later.

“You look fuckin’ sick, mate!” Niall says excitedly, which is exactly the reaction that Louis was hoping for, thank you very much, Niall. “Proper super villain.”

Louis beams down the phone, until he remembers that Niall can’t actually see him. “D’you think the balaclava’s a bit much?”

“Maybe you should get one of them Spiderman masks, but black!” Niall says. “Like Venom, in Spiderman 3, only without the shitty dancing.”

“I don’t think the dancing was related to the mask,” Louis says, but he’s not entirely certain on that one, because he mostly only went to see it because he had a bit of a thing for James Franco.

“Well, don’t do the dancing,” Niall says. “But you should get a cool mask.”

Louis makes a mental note to look into getting a good mask, especially as he’d sort of been thinking that himself. Maybe there’s a superhero shop online he can order one from. There probably isn’t a supervillain shop, because they’re very underappreciated in the community.

-

Louis's tipped over three wheelie bins and purposely stolen a handful of Argos pens, and he's now trying to spraypaint 'Flyman sucks' on the side of a building when Liam lands on the fire escape. It makes Louis jump but only a little bit, and that's only because he's trying to work out whether to add 'cock' on the end of it or if Harry would laugh at him and say it was wishful thinking.

"Did you tip those wheelie bins over?" Liam says, sounding disapproving. It doesn't seem like he's caught sight of Louis's graffiti yet. He would get Zayn to help, because Zayn uses spray paints a lot and Louis's just ended up with a lot of paint all over his hands, but Zayn said he doesn't want anything to do with it. Just because he's dating Perrie, who apparently does superhero stuff too even if Zayn won't tell them which one she is, _and_ Zayn's friends with all the heroes. There aren't enough villains in this city, that's what Louis thinks, and everyone should appreciate him more for doing something about it. Isn't his mum always telling him to be more proactive about things?

"Yes," Louis says, for lack of a better response. He wipes his paint hands on Liam, taking great delight in smearing the paint over his lycra and definitely not any delight at all in feeling Liam up, honestly.

"Why are you doing this?" Liam asks, confused - as though he's never heard of a nemesis or a super villain before, which is ridiculous, because everyone who watches the news knows that the London superhero Blackhawk's got about three. Louis expects that Liam probably thinks he's too good for this sort of thing. Good job Louis's around to prove him wrong.

"I'm your _nemesis_ ," he says, and folds his arms across his chest.

Liam, if possible, looks even more confused. "My what?"

"A super villain, Liam!" Louis says - he's not, whatever anyone thinks, shouting. He's _not_. "The Joker to your Bruce Wayne!"

"To my Batman," Liam corrects. "You can't use the superhero name for one and not the other - not that Joker was a superhero, but. Anyway." He grins crookedly at Louis from under his domino mask. "I think you're more of a Catwoman type, myself."

"Be that as it may, Liam--"

"Flyman," Liam says. "My - it's not fair, to use my name if I don't know yours, and my superhero name is, it's Flyman."

"I _know_ ," Louis says because, really, what kind of arch-nemesis would he be if he didn't? "But it's a stupid name, and I refuse to call you that. Seriously, mate, you're telling me you couldn't come up with anything better?"

"I thought it was okay," Liam says. "I mean, obviously I couldn't - Superman was taken, and all the best superheroes are just a thing with 'man' on the end, and I can fly, so I thought. Flyman." He shrugs a shoulder. "It's easy to spell, too. You know. For, like, autographs."

"It's stupid, is what it is," Louis says, and Liam frowns at him and says, "Well, what's your nem-- your villain name, then?"

Louis opens and closes his mouth a few times, and then folds his arms across his chest. "I'm not telling you. It's none of your business."

Liam's brows draw together. "It _is_ my business. You just said so yourself, you're my villain."

"I'm not! I'm _a_ villain," Louis says. "I'm not _your_ anything. Except your nemesis, like I said, but you don't even know what one is so it doesn't count. Besides," he says quickly, before Liam can interject, "if you're such a good superhero, you should be able to figure it out yourself." He smiles nastily when Liam doesn't say anything. "That's what I thought. What are you going to do, _Fly_ man? Fly it out of me?"

"I could do," Liam says. "I could fly up really high with you and threaten to drop you unless you tell me who you are."

Maybe, Louis thinks, he's underestimated Liam. The sight of him right now, scowling at Louis underneath his mask, arms crossed and posing all superhero-y in silhouette - well, add in the threat of being dropped, and maybe Louis is reluctantly impressed. Only a little bit.

"And what if I still didn't tell you?" Louis says, even so, because knowing when to leave things alone is not a skill anyone would say he has. "Would you just drop me?"

Liam scowls more. "Maybe."

"No, you wouldn't," Louis says cheerfully, and reaches forward to poke at Liam's face with one of the Argos pens. "You're too good for that sort of thing. You'd just have to put me down again, and then where would we be?"

"Where we are now," Liam says, and looks like he hadn't meant to say that. "I still think I should know your name, though. It's not like I even know what you look like, was the full face mask thing really necessary?"

" _Yes_ ," Louis says, more defensively than he'd like. "And it's not like I'm going to take lessons from _Flyman_. If I ever saw you without the mask, I'd easily recognise you, it's not like the bit around your eyes is that different."

"Flyman is a good name!" Liam says loudly and flushes - it might not be as visible under the mask, but his neck is definitely turning pink. "And you can't keep making fun of me for it if you're not going to tell me yours!"

"I guess you could call me... _Mysteryman_ ," Louis says, and bursts out laughing. "The look on your face, Liam. I'm not called Mysteryman; I'm certainly not taking naming tips from _you_."

"You can't even _see_ my face," Liam says, moodily, and tugs at his cape. "I'm going, anyway. You don't need saving from anything and you haven't even done anything wrong, so I'm not going to stand here for ages just so you can make fun of me."

"Yes I have!" Louis says, and pretends not to look as Liam steps backwards off the fire escape and hovers for a moment, before flying up into the air. It's definitely not impressive, at all.

-

Work is boring - work is _always_ boring, but Louis knows first-hand that he doesn't deal well with being unemployed. He'd probably be taking the supervillain plan up a notch, if he was, so it's for the best. Working in a pub suits him fine, usually - he can chat away to the regulars and he likes keeping busy (sort of, anyway) but today he's been stuck on the day shift, and it's not great. It's _dead_ , is what it is; even the usual old alcoholics aren't in for whatever reason. They're not allowed the TV on unless there's a football game and Louis never has the attention span to read anything, so he's bored out of his mind and wondering if he can get away with texting Harry to come over. Probably not; Harry was out with Grimmy last night, judging by one of the voicemails Louis woke up to, and won't be in any kind of fit state to go _anywhere_ today, let alone a pub.

It's not the worst thing in the world, anyway. Louis passes the time by balancing napkins on his face, making plans to fuck with Flyman some more and trying to come up with a supervillain name. It's pretty hard. The Butcher is the most famous supervillain - and the most dangerous, at the moment - but it's obvious why he's called that. He butchers people. In fact, the Butcher's level of imagination when it comes to naming himself is pretty much up there with Liam's, as far as Louis can tell, only the Butcher's lack of creativity actually sounds scary. It might be less scary if Blackhawk hadn't got to the Butcher's last victim too late, and the photos had ended up splashed all over the Daily Bugle's website.

Louis had been perfectly happy _not_ knowing what it looked like when someone's skin was flayed off, but there you go.

All in all, Louis's just coming up with what he thinks is a really good supervillain idea - and it doesn't involve skin flaying - when Zayn comes into the pub, the doorbell ringing merrily as he does so. It's unusual, mostly because Zayn doesn't actually drink, so there's no real reason for him to be in a pub on his own at, like, 11AM on a Monday morning.

"'Ey up," Louis says, when Zayn's finished giving the pub an exaggerated glare of distaste. It's not _that_ bad, just a bit dingy, and maybe Louis doesn't clean all the bits that he's supposed to. It's not like anyone even cares. Beer goggles exist for a reason. "What you doing here?"

"I can't just come visit one of my best mates when I feel like it?" Zayn says, sitting down on the bar stool and poking at the counter. It's not sticky, mostly because Louis got a napkin stuck to it earlier and had to clean the entire thing to get rid of the shreds remaining.

"You can," Louis says, "as proven by the fact that you _are_. But you never have done before, mate, so I'm a little bit suspicious."

Zayn shrugs, taps his fingers on the counter. "Can I get a glass of water or something? Bad service here, innit? Just can't get the help these days."

"I'm not the _help_ ," Louis says, in as an outraged a tone as he can muster, but it doesn't really work when he's grinning like this. Just - he hasn't seen Zayn in a while, maybe he missed him more than he let on. He still makes a big deal out of it when he goes to get the water, though, slamming glasses around and filling it right up to the top. "Here. Don't say I never do anything nice for you."

"Louis, this is your _job_ ," Zayn says, but he slurps away at the water anyway. "Just haven't seen you in a while, wondered how you were getting on."

"Well, I'm fine," Louis says. "Did someone send you to check in on me? Did Harry?"

"Fucking hell, _no_ ," Zayn says. "Can I not come see how you're getting on without a motive?" Louis doesn't say anything, just keeps staring at him until Zayn shifts around on his seat. "Alright, maybe I heard you've been hanging round with Liam."

"Aha!" There's a certain amount of triumph in Louis's voice, and he won't pretend otherwise, even as he pulls himself up to sit on the counter, his arse by Zayn's drink. Whatever, he's probably the cleanest thing on the counter right now. "Knew it. I thought I meant something to you, Zayn. I thought you actually wanted to know how I'm doing."

"I _do_ ," Zayn says, pulling his glass of water out of the way before Louis can knock it over. "But I wanted to know what the deal is with you and Li as well."

" _You_ said you didn't want anything to do with other superheroes, when I asked you to help me graffiti," Louis says. " _You_ said that you wanted to stay out of it."

"Yeah, but I didn't know it was Liam," Zayn says. "Liam's a mate, and Harry says you're going proper mental over him."

"I'm not _getting mental_ over him," Louis says. "I'm just bored and he's funny to mess with."

Zayn makes a face.

"I'm _not_ , fuck off," Louis says, and knocks Zayn's glass of water to prove his point. It spills all over Zayn’s trousers – although it’s only water, to be fair; it’s not like it’ll stain, but that doesn’t stop Zayn from leaping up and patting at his legs, glaring.

“God, Louis, you don’t have to be such a bastard all the time,” he snaps. “Most people can talk about someone they fancy without turning into a psychopath.”

“I don’t think spilling water makes me a psychopath,” Louis points out, but he does feel bad about it. Maybe it was a bit out of line. “I’m sorry, yeah?” he says eventually, and digs around under the bar to find a packet of crisps. “Here.”

“You can’t bribe me with food when you feel bad,” Zayn grumbles, but he sits back down anyway and rips them open. “I’m not Niall or Harry.”

“Thank God,” Louis says, and gives Zayn his best smile – not the charming one, the _real_ one. “Don’t think I could handle two of them. Can barely handle both of them in one place as it is.”

“Tell me about it,” Zayn mutters, and launches into a story about something that Harry did to impress Grimmy the other day, and how badly it all went. As far as Louis can tell, Harry had fallen asleep at the radio station and ended up missing a few hours of work, showing up with a zip indent on his face where he’d been using Grimmy’s hoodie as a pillow, but Zayn’s not the best at telling stories. He tends to start in the middle, realise he’s left an important bit out at the beginning and then spoil the ending.

Still, they’re not talking about Liam anymore, and so that’s good enough for Louis.

-

"Oh my God," Liam says as he lands. "I don't know whether to be annoyed or impressed."

"Annoyed," Louis says, then thinks about it and shrugs a shoulder. " _And_ impressed. Both, definitely both."

"But that's..." Liam trails off, seemingly speechless at the sight of Louis sprawled across his sofa, surrounded by all the other furniture from Liam's flat (not that there was much of it, really, Louis thinks that he was probably overdue for a trip to Home Bargains or something). On the roof.

Okay, so it had been incredibly fucking hard for Louis to move Liam's entire living room onto the roof of his building - especially as Niall and Harry had both refused to help, the lazy twats - but it was worth it for this, the payoff. The look on Liam's face right now. It's a great sort of confusion mixed with upset, and Louis is definitely enjoying it. Besides, Liam can just fly all of his furniture back or something. Maybe he could even get some new stuff, God knows he could do with it. Really, Louis is doing him a _favour_. It's not his fault if Liam can't realise that.

(Plus, he’s got a really cool new mask. It’s sort of like Venom’s. Niall had thrown it at him last time he came over and just said ‘oi, mate, I got you this’. It’s really sick.)

Liam sighs, hands still on hips. "I just don't get why you're doing this."

"Arch-"

"Nemesis, yeah, you said," Liam says, and flops down on the sofa next to Louis, rubbing his hands over his face. "It just seems like a lot of effort, mate. Don't you have anything else to do?"

"Well, we can't all fly around saving people," Louis says, stung. " _Sorry_ , Liam, that my past-times don't live up to your lofty standards."

"That's not what I said," Liam says patiently, and reaches over the arm of the sofa to where the mini-fridge is. "Beer?"

"No," Louis says, and then, "yes, okay, alright. I thought you couldn't drink, though? Harry said-"

He cuts himself off but it's too late; there's already a smile blooming over Liam's face as he hands Louis a bottle of Beck's, the glass sweating beneath his fingertips. "You know Harry? Is that how you knew my name?"

"Harry who?" Louis says, and wonders how to open the beer with no bottle opener. "I don't know any Harrys."

Liam rolls his eyes but he's smiling, even as he hands Louis his own open bottle and takes Louis's from him. Louis missed the part where Liam opened it, though, so he's not sure if Liam's actually got a bottle opener or just superhero strength. Maybe Strongman didn't seem like a good enough superhero name. It'd still be better than bloody _Flyman_ , though.

"You said Harry told you I couldn't drink," Liam says, and takes a swallow of his beer, while Louis absolutely does not watch the way Liam's throat works as he drinks. "I only know one Harry, so maybe it's that one. But anyway, I didn't use to be able to - I had a liver thing - but then when I got my superpower, my liver just..." Liam shrugs. "Healed."

"Do you have healing powers?" Louis asks, in spite of himself, but Liam shakes his head.

"Nope. Don't know why it happened."

"You're the most boring superhero ever," Louis says, before he can stop it, but Liam just smiles wider like Louis's given him a compliment. "I mean it."

"I know you do," Liam says, and nudges into his side. "Are you going to drink that, because it'll go flat if you're not but I've got, like, a thing - a bottle top thing to stop it from doing that --"

"You're like an old man," Louis says, but he drinks his beer. "How do you know Harry anyway? Not that I know him, but you said you did. So. How _do_ you? Did you save him from something?"

"I did an interview at the radio station his boyfriend works at," Liam says. "Harry just sort of... friended me. Friended at me. Do you know what I mean?"

"Not that I know this Harry, but _if I did_ , I would know what you meant," Louis replies. When did his beer get so empty? "Hypothetically."

"You're very contentious," Liam says, and refuses to meet Louis's eyes when Louis kicks him.

" _Contentious_?" he repeats, kicking Liam again when Liam keeps stubbornly staring out over the city, instead of looking at Louis instead. "What the fuck are you on about, Liam?"

"It means _argumentative_ ," Liam says, and shrugs a shoulder. "I've got a word of the day calendar, shut up."

"Right," Louis says, shaking his head. "Of course you have. And you still couldn't come up with anything better than--"

Liam's hand is over his mouth in an instant, hot and heavy and maybe making something twitch in Louis's pants. Not for the first time, he's rethinking his decision to wear skinnies as part of his costume. "Don't say it," Liam says warningly. "I get it, you think it's a stupid name, just - shut up about it, alright?"

If it was anyone else, Louis would lick their hand to get them to move it, but he feels frozen in place right now. There’s something grounding and – okay, sexy – about Liam’s hand over his mouth. Like Louis wouldn’t be able to say anything, even if he wanted to.

Liam seems to realise just then how long he’s had his hand there and drops it, stepping back a little. Louis knows that now’s the time he should say something to not make it weird, some comment or mean quip, but he’s still pinned to the spot, feeling the ghost of Liam’s hand over his mouth. He reaches up to touch where it was before he can stop himself, and Liam’s eyes follow his hand like he can’t help himself.

Louis knows, logically, that all Liam can see is the printed mouth on his mask, all curled smile and sharp teeth like a Halloween pumpkin, but the weight of Liam’s gaze makes him feel like Liam can see the way Louis’s biting his lip at the thought of getting Liam’s hands on him again.

He’s not sure which one of them stands up first, but Liam’s gone by the time Louis looks around.

-

Louis isn’t even _doing_ anything the next time he sees Liam. He’d been planning on it – got his costume on and everything – but then his mum had called and he’d spoken to his sisters and he’d ended up just feeling a bit homesick, really, which is why he’s sitting morosely on a bench in the park and kicking at the flowers.

He doesn’t see Liam land, but he sees him prod at Louis’s leg with his own foot. “Leave the flowers alone, yeah?”

“Oh my _God_ ,” Louis says. “I’m not in the mood, I wasn’t even doing it on purpose, shut up.”

Liam makes a face, like he doesn’t quite know whether to believe Louis or not, and it only winds him up more.

“Just fuck off,” he snaps. “I told you I’m not in the mood. Not everything’s about superheroes, you know. I’ll leave the fucking flowers alone.”

“Okay,” Liam says softly, but he doesn’t leave. “I don’t – I know not everything’s about heroes, but you’re in costume, so I thought…”

“I’ve clocked off for the day,” Louis says. “I fucked everything up that I wanted to and you didn’t even notice—” which is a lie, because this is the first time Louis’s left the house today, but Liam doesn’t have to know that, “and now I just want to sit here and I couldn’t be arsed going home to get changed first.”

“Okay,” Liam says again, and sits down next to Louis, like he has a death wish or something. Just because Louis said he’s not in the mood for any more supervillain-ing right now doesn’t mean that he couldn’t change his mind. He’s pretty sure that Superman would never sit down next to Lex Luthor, if he saw him in the park.

Actually, maybe he would, but Superman’s an alien so he’s weird anyway. Batman probably wouldn’t sit down next to the Joker, and that’s a much better comparison. Louis would be a terrible Lex Luthor, anyway.

“So,” Liam says, and kicks Louis’s ankle. “You thought of a villain name yet? It’s a bit hard for me to tell people about my nemesis if I don’t even have a name for you.”

Louis hasn’t, actually, but it’s a distraction so he’ll take it.

"I'm Loki," he says, and Liam makes a confused face and says, "You can't be Loki, he already exists in comic books."

"He already existed in _Norse mythology_ , but they still put him in the comic books," Louis points out, but he thinks that maybe Liam's right, actually. It could be a lot to live up to, especially when the Thor movies have just come out, pretty much. He pouts - not that Liam can see it through his mask and honestly, it's getting a bit too hot for this full face thing, he doesn't know how anyone else does it - and says, "Fine, I'm the Trickster. That's not taken, it can't be."

"I don't know if it is or not," Liam says slowly, and Louis rolls his eyes and says, "Yes, well, it is taken now because I've just taken it. So there."

"Flyman and the Trickster," Liam says. "Batman and the Joker. I guess it sort of works."

"Just because I'm your nemesis doesn't mean that I like - _belong_ with you or anything," Louis says, which makes a lot more sense in his head than it seems to once he hears himself saying it out loud. He just meant that he didn't want to be linked to Flyman forever, that's all; just because Liam is usually the one who shows up when Louis's done something doesn't mean that one of the other superheroes _couldn't_. It's not like - otherwise, if he focuses on Liam, it make him feel like he's some stupid fanboy. And he's not. He's a _villain_.

"Riiiight," Liam says, with the familiar expression - the one where he can't quite work out whether he should be amused or upset. Like he doesn't understand what Louis's saying, but he's willing to concede that it could be his own fault. It's annoyingly endearing. "But I mean - okay, fine, whatever."

" _Fine_ ," Louis says, because it is, and wonders if Liam would be hurt if he kicked his shin or if he's got some kind of body armour on. He probably has, because it'd be stupid not to. "Maybe I'll go get an apprenticeship with the Butcher or something, if you don't think I'm a proper villain."

"I never said that," Liam says uncertainly. "And don't joke about that, you don't know what he's like."

Louis does, in fact, know what the Butcher is like - sort of. He knows enough to know that the Butcher really is a proper supervillain, to a scary degree, and that he wouldn't really want to go anywhere near him. It doesn't stop him from rolling his eyes - not that Liam can see - and saying, "Maybe _you_ don't know what _I'm_ like."

"Well, I don't," Liam says. "You wear a mask all the time and you won't even tell me your name."

"That's how it's supposed to go!" Louis points out, slightly more loudly than he meant to. "Just because you go around with your real name and your stupid mask - _you're_ not doing secret identities properly, you can't be mad at me just because I _am_."

“I didn’t say I was mad at you,” Liam says. “I just asked you not to joke about the Butcher, you always overreact to everything.”

“God, Liam, I said I _wasn’t in the mood_ ,” Louis snaps. “You’re the one still sat here going on at me, I don’t know how much clearer I can make it.”

Liam flushes pink, then red, blinking rapidly. “ _Sorry_ ,” he says, with enough emphasis that Louis can’t tell if he’s being sarcastic or not. “I’ll just leave you to it, then, shall I?”

“Yes,” Louis says, and he wishes for the first time that he wasn’t wearing a mask, so Liam could see how hard Louis’s glaring at him right now. “Just fuck off.”

Liam does, still looking upset and angry and like he can’t quite tell how to react, but Louis doesn’t care at all. It’s not like he isn’t used to missing people.

-

Liam looks like he’s waiting for an apology next time Louis sees him, which is enough to get his back up right away.

“For someone who claims to be a superhero, you spend a lot of time flying around after _me_ ,” Louis says, and folds his arms across his chest.

Liam sighs, the really tired one that Louis has a sneaking suspicion he reserves just for him. It’s secretly his favourite. “Louis, you’ve made an army of wheelie bins. I’ve got to put them all back.”

It’s possibly one of Louis’s greatest achievements and he can tell that Liam likes it, because he’s smiling even while he’s trying to look pissed off. What Louis did was this: he stole all the wheelie bins from this street and the next one and stuck googly eyes on them before lining them up in front of him. Supervillains are supposed to have armies of inanimate objects turned animate, Louis’s pretty sure, and this is a good one.

“It’s a good army,” he says instead, from the back of the wheelie bins. Wheelie bins are a bit rubbish at defence, though, because Liam easily flies over them and comes to land next to Louis.

The thing is, wheelie bins are rubbish at defence but Louis _isn’t_ , and he barely hesitates before reaching out to push Liam over. Neither of them were expecting it, and that’s probably the reason why Liam ends up flat on his back with a scraped hand.

Liam looks more annoyed than Louis’s ever seen him, especially when Louis doesn’t even offer a hand to help him up.

“You’re such a twat,” Liam says, and frowns.

There’s no explanation for what Louis does next, except for the fact that the fumes from the wheelie bins have probably gone to his head – he reaches over to grab Liam’s hurt hand and pulls him closer, kissing him.

He forgets about the Venom mask, until Liam puts both of his hands on Louis’s chest and gently moves him backwards.

“I don’t mind,” Liam starts, probably because he can tell that Louis is about to flounce – well, not flounce, but something similar. “Maybe if you could take the mask off, though?”

"I'm not taking my mask off," Louis says, incensed. "Besides, you're into all that stupid superhero shit, you'll probably be jizzing yourself at the thought of recreating the Spiderman kiss."

Liam flushes and says, "It's nothing like that, because you're not upside down, for one, and also I'm not taking my mask off either then."

"As if _that_ makes a difference," Louis says, as scathingly as he knows how. "I can see most of your face anyway. The mask'll probably fall off, anyway, unless you stuck it on with superglue."

Liam turns pink, which is all of it takes for Louis to feel delighted. "Liam! You didn't!"

"Just at first," Liam says defensively. "I couldn't work out how to keep it on, so I - well, it didn't work, and I don't anymore."

"I _bet_ it didn't," Louis says. "Oh my God, Liam. How did you even get it off?"

"It was hard," Liam admits, and that's all the incentive Louis needs to lean in and wiggle his eyebrows - okay, so that doesn't work with a mask, maybe Louis hasn't entirely thought this through - and said, "You know what else is hard?"

Liam says, "No," which is a bit of a buzzkill but no matter what _anyone_ says later, Louis definitely doesn't shriek when he says, "My _dick_ , Liam, Jesus Christ. How are you so bad at this?"

"I'm not," Liam says, "or at least - not bad at _this_ bit." Louis's about to ask exactly what Liam's even talking about when Liam reaches out and somehow reels him in, pulling him flush against him - there's no body armour under there, but Liam's warm and firm and yes, something else is definitely hard. _Two_ somethings, judging by the feel of it. By which Louis means his dick, and also Liam's.

As much as Louis wants to get his hands on – quite honestly – every single part of Liam he can reach, there’s something about kissing him that he wants to do the most. He half considered leaving his mask _on_ , but – Liam’s biting his lip even as he looks at Louis, where the eye shapes are on the mask, and it’s a bit of a heady rush that Liam doesn’t even really know what Louis looks like and he still wants – well, _him_.

Louis wants to punch Liam in the stomach, but he wants to kiss him more so he settles for a sort of compromise – he rolls up the bottom of his mask, clumsy with haste and his fingers shaking, and then sort of smashes his mouth against Liam’s.

It’s not sexy, or at least it shouldn’t be. It’s awkward and slightly painful; their mouths are mashed together hard enough to bruise, and his teeth are clacking against Liam’s, not to mention that Louis’s pretty sure he can feel blood pooling in his mouth. It’s rough and it hurts, and Liam makes a noise in the back of his throat – Louis _made_ Liam make that noise, a guttural sort of moan, and he takes advantage of the opportunity to pull away and bite down on Liam’s neck instead. He wants to explore the whole range of noises that Liam can make, and the one he makes while Louis’s sucking on his neck with every intention of leaving a mark is in definite consideration to be Louis’s favourite.

“You’re such a prick,” Liam gasps, like every word’s an effort – Louis smirks into his skin. “You _know_ people are going to see that.”

“Exactly,” Louis says – well, hums, his voice is a little muffled – but Liam’s hand is splayed over the side of Louis’s face, one thumb stroking the top of his cheek where mask meets skin, and he doesn’t seem like he really minds at all. But seriously, why do they both have costumes that cover so much _skin_? Maybe those sexy superhero costumes are onto something.

He doesn’t spare much time to think about it, because he’s too busy desperately to find the top of Liam’s weird lycra trousers – there’s no obvious gap between the shirt and trousers and he’s hoping it’s not one of them all in one things because as fit as it would be to have Liam completely naked, right now he just wants to get his hands on Liam’s dick, and he doesn’t want Liam to have chance to change his mind in the middle of it.

Luckily, Liam seems to be on the same wavelength – he’s blushing but resolutely guides Louis’s hand to the waistband, and Louis is nothing if not resourceful. It doesn’t take him long to work his hand down the front of Liam’s trousers – there’s almost no give at all and his hand is flattered against Liam’s hips – it’s another of those things that shouldn’t be sexy at all but somehow really, really is. Liam is going to be the death of him, all warm and solid underneath Louis’s hand.

“I can’t believe I’m doing this,” Liam mumbles, from where he’s scraping his teeth across Louis’s jaw. If he’d said it at any other point then Louis would’ve stopped but he’s got one hand wrapped around Liam’s dick – he stills, but doesn’t pull away.

“You can stop any time you like,” he says tersely, instead.

“What? No,” Liam says, and drops his head onto Louis’s shoulder. “I just meant, you know. _In public_.”

The roof of Liam’s building isn’t really public – it’s not like anyone’s about to come up there. Liam doesn’t know, but Louis put a ‘do not enter’ sign at the foot of the stairwell when he moved Liam’s furniture up there, and he never bothered to get rid of it again, although he didn’t anticipate that it’d come in this useful, either.

Louis’s tempted to stop just to teach Liam a lesson, but realistically it’d be just as shitty to do to himself and besides, he doesn’t really _want_ to stop. Not when the weight of Liam is hot and heavy in his hand, and Louis can curl his fingers around Liam’s dick and start to wank him off, slowly and with all the tricks he knows.

Maybe Louis should be a sexy supervillain instead. Maybe he is more of a Catwoman to Liam’s Batman than he initially let himself think.

The way that Liam looks when he comes – all O face and fluttering eyelashes – is almost enough to have Louis coming right there. If it wasn’t, then Liam getting on his knees and fumbling with Louis’s zipper is just as bad.

“I want to try this,” Liam says, looking up at Louis like he’d say _no_ or something. “Can I – just let me.”

Louis’s trying to come up with something clever to say but it’s difficult when Liam’s working Louis’s underwear down, barely pausing before he leans forward and take Louis in his mouth. And okay, Louis’s not a teenage boy anymore (he’s an _adult_ , thank you very much) so he should be ashamed at how little time it is before he’s bucking and coming – and Liam fucking _swallows_ it, wiping one hand across his mouth and glancing up at Louis like he’s about to apologise.

And if anyone was going to make fun of him for coming quickly – which they’re not, because Louis is so not telling anyone about this – then they clearly have never seen Liam’s face like this. The sight of Liam on his knees, looking up all debauched, would be enough to make anyone fucking jizz in their pants.

“Right,” Louis says weakly, when Liam stands back up. He’s still got his trousers around his ankles, he realises, and manages to pull them up while being simultaneously amazed that his legs haven’t given out. “That was. Thank you.”

“Um,” Liam says, looking confused – well, it’s not like it’s _Louis’s_ fault that he doesn’t know what the etiquette is here, he’s never been given a blowjob on a rooftop from a superhero before and oh my God, it sounds even more ridiculous like that, how is this his life? “You’re welcome?”

“Aaand now I feel like I’m in an episode of The OC,” Louis says inanely. He wants to leave, but he can’t fly and this is Liam’s rooftop. There’s only one thing for it. “D’you reckon you could give me a lift back to mine? One of them, you know.” He flaps his arms to try and get the whole ‘flying’ thing across, but Liam still looks stunned. “Flying, Liam,” he says. “Can you fly me back?”

“Of course,” Liam says, seemingly choosing to rely on his innate politeness. “Let’s go?”

It might be the only flying ride home that Louis’s ever had, but he thinks even if it wasn’t, it’d still be the most awkward.

-

Louis makes a point of never mentioning the sex stuff, but it still somehow keeps happening every time they see each other.

-

It’s been a long day. Louis’s running out of things, sort of, to piss Liam off. It’s not his fault or a lack of imagination, it’s more the fact that he wants to see Liam pretty much every day – what, he’s a growing boy, he needs sex – and it’s difficult to come up with that many supervillain-y things to do that frequently.

He’s not sure if Liam’s caught on or if he just thinks that Louis’s really committed to the cause – the last thing he did was put some fake stations on the underground map in Hampstead station. There aren’t many tourists around there but there were enough for them to be confused by Louis’s additions (although nothing he came up with could be as funny as Cockfosters, and that one _actually exists_.

They haven’t got to any sex yet because Liam is legitimately annoyed about the tube map thing, and they’re right in the middle of an argument about it when Louis turns a corner and sees a small child - a girl, on her own, about three or four years old, maybe, with brown curly hair and a ripped pinafore dress. Louis's heart goes out to her immediately - even more so when he realises there's no one around but them, and she's alone.

"Um," Liam says, when the little girl looks at both of them and starts crying. He's useless, honestly, and Louis doesn't bother with even a cursory eye roll as he kneels down to face her.

"Hey, sweetheart, what's your name?"

She's still wailing, one hand out in front of her like a shield between her and Louis, and it takes him a few moments to actually hear the words in what she's saying. "Don' like mask! Mask scary!"

Well, shit. Louis risks a glance back at Liam, who's hovering close and looks concerned, underneath his domino mask. Out of the two of them, Louis reckons the full face get up is probably going to be the one scaring her - he's not sure if she'd count Liam's stupid domino thing as a mask.

"I don't suppose I can ask you to not look at me if I take my mask off?" he asks hopefully, and Liam blinks, confused.

"What? Oh, uh - well, I mean, I can try, if you want?" He kneels down next to Louis regardless, but the girl seems to dislike Liam even more, and turns away from him.

Louis's a bit worried that she's going to run away, so it's easier than it should be for him to say, "Hey, no, it's okay, love, look," and tug off his mask with one hand. His hair's all everywhere, and he's resolutely not looking at Liam - but it works. She turns back to him, putting one hand in her mouth instead of out between them. "It's alright, the mask's gone, see?"

"Don' like mask," she says again, but a bit more uncertainly, and Louis stuffs it in his pocket and holds his arms out to her. She lets him pick her up, hiding her face in his neck and still chewing on her fingers. Well. Louis isn't exactly sure where he's supposed to go from now. He should probably actually look at Liam. It's not like he's scared or anything - he's a super villain, after all. This might not even be his real face, for all Liam knows, and really, Louis isn't stupid - he knows that getting this kid home safely is more important than his stupid identity or whatever. Still, it just - it makes things more difficult. Louis feels a bit, you know. Exposed. It's weird.

Liam's neck is pink and he determinedly looks away from Louis's face when Louis looks at him, which is nice but also really impractical. Louis isn't sure whether Liam just isn't saying anything about Louis being the one he knocked over outside Argos - although throwing Argos pens at him that time probably wasn't exactly subtle - or if he just hasn't realised. This is Liam, after all; it could easily be either.

"What's your name, love?" he says instead to the girl, and she takes her hand out of her mouth and puts it on his face.

"Katy," she says, and Louis nods.

"Very nice name, Katy. Well, I'm -" He realises too late that not only is he giving away his face but he's probably giving away his name, too, but it's tough - he can't exactly introduce himself to a small child as the Trickster. "Louis," he finishes, and now it's his turn to determinedly not look at Liam. "It's nice to meet you, gorgeous."

Katy laughs, and pushes her hand into his face some more. Louis turns his face away from her a little, but chooses to take that as a good sign.

"Hey," Liam says softly, and Louis's stomach jolts a little before he realises that Liam is talking to Katy, which, fair enough, it's not like it meant anything _anywhere_. She's still not looking at Liam, but she's not flinching away or anything, and she lets him stroke her hair. It's adorable. Louis hates him, a little bit. "Where do your parents live? Or do you know your home phone number?"

This at last gets Katy to raise her head, and she nods vigorously. "Five seven oh, three three two," she says, in the tone of someone who's memorised the phrase with little to no idea what it actually _means_.

"I hope it's this area code or we're fucked," Louis says quietly to Liam, who makes a face like he can't quite decide whether to tell Louis off for swearing or not. Louis isn't stupid; he made sure that he said it quietly enough that Katy wouldn't hear him. He's not enough of a super villain to go around teaching young kids to swear, give him _some_ credit.

"I'm sure it will be," Liam says firmly, and then makes a face at Louis. "Er. Do you have a phone on you?"

"You _don't_?" Louis says, somewhat incredulously, and Liam gives an embarrassed shrug.

"It doesn't really - I don't have pockets in this outfit."

"So you _are_ just pleased to see me," Louis says, with an added leer for good measure, and enjoys the way the tips of Liam's ears pink up. "Yeah, don't worry, I've - it's in my back pocket." He sort of tilts himself towards Liam, who just looks confused. He's lucky it's a good look on him. "My hands are full with this one," Louis says, nodding at Katy, who seems about ready to fall asleep on his shoulder now she's done her duty and given them her parents' phone number. "You'll have to get it."

Liam makes a face - as though he hasn't had his hands down Louis's trousers before, and he didn't even know what Louis _looked_ like, then, maybe - but he slides his hands into Louis's back pocket anyway. Louis does a little wiggle for good measure, careful not to wake Katy, and he hears Liam hiss between his teeth before pulling the phone out.

He's still not looking at Louis when he makes the call, but that's fine.

-

"Um," Liam says, when they're heading away from Katy's house (and he’s stopped being embarrassed about how completely grateful her parents were). "I. Fuck it." It's enough to make Louis turn to look at him, because he's never heard Liam swear before, and when he does it's to see that Liam's taken the domino mask off.

And really, Liam's weird inflated sense of justice should've meant that Louis knew this was coming, but somehow he thought that - anyway. It's funny, because he's been saying from the start that the bits of his face that the mask covers up don't really hide anything - he can still see Liam's eyes, mostly, and nose and mouth, and his hair - but they look different when they're all together. _Liam_ looks different - like he's being Liam, and not Flyman (really, nothing in the world will ever be able to make Louis take that seriously). It's just confusing. It's one thing actively pissing off Flyman, who bollocked Louis for stealing a pen, and another thing trying to upset Liam, who tries to be nice to lost children and smiles at Louis like that. Not at the Trickster, at _Louis_.

"So, um, what do you do?" Liam says. "Or do you - is the villain thing full time? I mean, I know some superheroes can get a government stipend--"

"They _can_?" Louis is outraged. " _That's_ not fair. Villains can't get those, and superheroes wouldn't even have a job if it wasn't for us. I'm going to write a letter of complaint, or - or steal yours --"

"I don't get one," Liam interrupts, and goes to push his hair out of his eyes with one hand when Louis looks at him, ducking his head slightly. "I didn't - It's only for big superheroes, like, I could get it but I'd have to start taking on villains like the Butcher, or holding up bridges."

"Why don't you do that?" Louis demands. He's seen Liam in action, and he's definitely not inadequate - he could be up there with the rest of the superheroes, if he wanted to. Louis's sure of it. "You could do that."

"But then who'd do the other things?" Liam asks, and he sounds so earnest that Louis is - not surprised, not exactly, just. It's just funny that Liam even _exists_ , sometimes, that's all. "I mean, not just sorting out the stuff you're doing, like mixing up the recycling, but helping Katy, or the old man who got lost the other day. I couldn't help with that stuff if I had to go fight the Butcher all the time."

It's Louis's turn to say "Fuck," this time, and he barely sees Liam's expression change before he's yanking him forward, one hand curled in the collar of Liam's lycra suit, smashing his mouth into Liam's so hard that he's pretty sure he can taste blood again. Liam's gasp is swallowed up by Louis, and Louis feels himself smiling smugly as he licks into Liam's mouth, nipping at Liam's lower lip. It's nicer, when he can open his eyes and see all of Liam's face, his lowered eyelashes sooty and dark against his skin (because of _course_ Liam keeps his eyes closed when he's kissing, Louis shouldn't even really be surprised).

Liam still hasn’t asked what any of this _means_ , like Louis was expecting him to, and he’s relieved – he barely knows himself and even if he did, Louis refuses to talk about his feelings. Refuses to even admit that he _has_ any, most of the time. If he wasn’t already a really good supervillain, Louis is pretty sure that he’d make a really good robot. A cool one, though, like Bender from Futurama.

It’s difficult to keep this train of thought going when Liam is grinding his hips into Louis’s; shameless in a way that he never thought Liam could be. It’s all that Louis can do to keep from coming in his pants when Liam pulls back to look at him, all big dark eyes and a wrecked looking mouth, red from being bitten.

Liam is definitely about to say something, so Louis takes advantage to grab a handful of Liam’s hair, growing out curly from the buzzcut, and pull him in. Liam gasps again and does something with his hips that has Louis seeing stars. He’s in no way some blushing virgin, but Liam just… _does_ something to him. Maybe it’s the superpowers.

One day, Louis is pretty sure, they’ll move on from just dry-humping until they both come but right now it’s intoxicating enough that it’s almost impossible to think of anything else.

Still – “I’m going to blow you next time,” he says in Liam’s ear, as filthy as he knows how to make it, and Liam draws in a shuddering breath before almost collapsing against him.

Louis puts up with him for at least five minutes before pushing Liam off him and trying to adjust himself, ignoring the sticky mess in his underwear. It’s not like it’s the first time he’s had to deal with something like that, and he doesn’t want to stick around and enjoy the afterglow in some back alley.

Liam’s still looking at him, like he does every time this happens, and something about it rankles.

“Sorry, did you expect a cuddle?” Louis says, and rolls his eyes. “It’s nice that you think I’m classy enough that you’re trying to fuck me in some alley now, though, Liam. I can tell you’re not the type to respect me in the morning.”

“What?” Liam says, sounding just betrayed enough for Louis to feel bad. Not like that ever stopped him, though. “No, I – we could go to mine, if you want. Next time, I mean.”

Louis curls his lip, sticking his hands into his pockets. It was a mistake, because it’s pulling the material uncomfortably across his dick, but he’s not going to change his position now. “I’ll pass on that one,” he says. “Don’t need your sympathy fucks, thanks.”

“It’s not—” Liam starts, but Louis isn’t going to wait around to hear whatever well-meant excuse Liam’s got this time. He’s perfectly happy with things the way that they are, and that’s what he tells himself as he leaves.

Louis doesn’t let himself look back.

-

Louis’s half asleep and wondering whether he should keep watching Netflix or switch to porn and wank off (he’s kidding himself if he thinks he’ll fantasise about anyone other than Liam, but it’s still worth a try) when he hears the tap on his window. 

It’s definitely a tap or a knock and not just a leaf – besides, Harry’s the one who always gets freaked out when he hears things – so Louis doesn’t think twice about kneeling up on his bed and opening the window, pushing the curtains aside. 

He doesn’t know what he expects but it’s not to see Flyman there, in costume – hunched over with one arm curled protectively over his stomach, looking defeated. Louis can see at least two bruises and the arm of the costume is gone to shreds entirely, and he wastes no time in hauling Liam over the window sill and onto his bed before closing the window behind him, making sure to lock it. 

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realise that Liam’s obviously been in a superhero-y fight and lost, and Liam looks like he’s in no state to explain. Louis may not have encountered this exact situation before, but his mum’s looked after him when he’s been in fights and he’s dealt with his sisters enough after various break-ups to know what to do regardless. 

When he gets back – with bandages and hot water and a chocolate bar – Liam’s already half asleep, with his feet hanging off the end of the bed. Probably so he doesn’t get mud on the sheets from his shoes, Louis realises, because of course Liam’s still thinking about things like that even when he’s a battered mess.

It works out well, though; means that Louis can cut away the spandex covering Liam’s chest without too many objections. There are a number of scattered cuts, but none of them look too deep – there’s one on his arm, which is nasty, and Louis manages to get most of the blood off before carefully bandaging it up.

Liam looks like he’s drifting in and out of sleep and Louis lets himself look at Liam while he’s working – really look at him, in a way that he usually stops himself from doing in case Liam sees him.

When he’s finished, he sets the bowl of water and bandages aside, somewhere that he can’t knock them over later when he’s inevitably forgotten about them, and climbs onto the bed next to Liam. If Liam was awake and unhurt, Louis would never allow himself this, but the situation’s different now and he watches Netflix with the volume turned right down, sometimes stroking Liam’s hair when he mutters in his sleep.

The sun’s gone down by the time Liam wakes up, and he jerks awake – Louis can see the exact moment where he works out where he is and calms down.

“I’m sorry,” Liam says, wincing as he sits up. “I shouldn’t have come here.”

“It’s fine,” Louis says dismissively, because it _is_ , but Liam shakes his head.

“I’ve got to go,” he says, and Louis frowns, reaching out to prod at one of his bandages and ignoring the way Liam hisses through his teeth. 

“You really shouldn’t,” he says. “You’ll open up some of those cuts, for a start.” 

“I’ve got to go,” Liam insists stubbornly, and heads over to the window, unlocking it and pushing it open. Louis knew he shouldn’t have left the key right under it. Liam stops, and turns before he jumps out, eyes searching Louis’s face. “Thank you,” he says quietly. 

And then he’s gone. 

-

 _hello louis_ , the text says, _this is liam sorry I got your number from when u calld katys parents._

Louis’s a bit confused. Still, never one to shy away from new things, he sends back _alright liam ?_

_lol yeh im fineee jus wondered if yu want to hang outtt? :)_

“This is a bit weird,” he says out loud, and Harry looks over. They’re technically playing FIFA but Harry’s almost as bad at videogame footie as he is in real life – evidenced by the fact that Louis’s been messing about on his phone for at least five minutes and Harry hasn’t even managed to score one goal.

“What is?”

Louis waves his phone at him. “Liam’s texting me, wants to know if I want to hang out. That’s a bit weird, isn’t it?”

“You’ve been getting off with him for ages,” Harry says, looking like _Louis’s_ the one that’s being a bit weird. “So not really, no.” He lights up, in a way that can only mean trouble. “Invite him over!”

“What? No!”

It’s too late, though; Harry’s taken advantage of Louis’s distraction to steal his phone, and there’s no point trying to fight him. When Harry gets an idea in his head, it’s usually more trouble than it’s worth to try and stop him.

“Here,” Harry says, after a moment or two, looking triumphant. “I wrote, ‘Love to, come over to mine and Harry’s,’ and then I wrote down directions and I put a happy face. Not a smiley one but the one with a capital D. Then I put two kisses. You’re welcome.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Louis says, even as Harry throws the phone back over to him. “That’s so obviously from you.”

“No, it’s not,” Harry says, at the same time as Louis’s phone beeps – it’s Liam’s reply. “What did he say?”

“He said ‘hi, Harry’,” Louis says, and sticks his tongue out at Harry. At least, that’s the gist of it; there are a few more lol’s and misspellings, but that’s neither here nor there. “Also he’s on his way over. But you’ve got to talk to him, because I don’t want to. _You’re_ the one that’s invited him over.”

They’ve pretty much given up on FIFA at this point and it’s not long before there’s a knock at the door – Harry turns to Louis with big eyes and says, “D’you think he _flew here_?”

“Ask him when you answer the door,” Louis says, and flops back on the sofa. “ _I’m_ not answering it.”

“You’re such a twat,” Harry says cheerfully, but he gets up to answer the door anyway. It’s Liam, of course it is, and Harry sounds nothing short of delighted to see him. Harry’s the worst. “Do you want a banana?”

“Um, okay,” Liam says, and when they come into the room, they’ve both got a banana in hand. Harry’s addicted to fruit, which is fair enough, and Louis reckons that Liam was probably just too polite to say no. They’re _both_ ridiculous, anyway. Louis really needs some new friends.

The best bit, though, is that Liam’s still in his superhero costume – minus the mask – and Louis can’t help sitting up straight. “Ey, how’d you text me if you’re in your costume?” he demands, forgetting that he wasn’t going to speak to either of them. Whatever. “Thought you didn’t have anywhere to put your phone?”

Liam shrugs a shoulder, sitting down next to Louis and picking up the discarded controller. “After Katy, I thought it’d be best if I kept it on me. Look, I’ve got a utility belt now, I put it in there.”

“This whole superhero thing just keeps getting stupider and stupider,” Louis says, feeling inordinately pleased by this.

"Wait, wait, I've got it," Harry says. He looks much too proud of himself, but Liam's too busy eating his banana to say anything. "Right now... you're the Caped Fruit-sader. Get it?"

"No," Louis says, before Liam can swallow, but Harry just beams at him and says, "Don't you find my jokes a- _peel_ -ing? D'you get it?"

"Stop saying 'get it'," Louis says. "We all get it."

"And yet you never laugh," Harry says mournfully, and points at Louis with his own banana. "You know who finds my jokes funny? Grimmy does."

"No, Grimmy pretends he does so you won't ditch him for someone younger and hotter," Louis says. "But joke's on you, because he'll realise how much of a loser you are, and do it first."

Harry just smiles at him around a mouth of banana though, like he knows Louis's lying. Louis wouldn't say it otherwise, but still.

"No, he won't," Liam says. "I mean, I know how much of a loser _you_ are, and I'm still here."

Harry dissolves into laughter, which does nothing to drown out Louis's gasp. "Liam! I'm shocked that you'd betray me like this. Especially as I'm supposed to be the evil one."

"Supposed to be," Liam says cheerfully. "You're not right good at it, though."

“You just wait, Liam,” Louis says as ominously as he can. It’s not very ominous at all, judging by the amusement on Liam’s face. “I think I liked you better when you wore the mask.”

“Probably,” Liam agrees, and reaches out, circling his fingers around Louis’s ankle. It’s not skin on skin in a way that’s ever done anything for Louis before, and it’s strange how Liam keeps surprising him. How much Louis is into this, barely daring to move in case Liam takes his hand away. (Harry’s laughing at him, he can tell out of the corner of his eye. Fucking traitor.)

“You shouldn’t be able to play FIFA with one hand,” Louis says grumpily, reaching out for one of the yogurts that Harry brought in with him – seriously, everyone goes on about Niall eating a lot, but Harry’s such a snacker. Just because he says it’s healthy doesn’t mean it’s okay.

Liam _does_ look at him this time, mouth curling up at the side. “I can do lots with one hand.”

“Okay, I’m going to call Nick,” Harry says loudly, standing up and stomping out of the room. Louis’s friends have never been subtle, but he loves them anyway.

He loves trading lazy kisses with Liam even more, though.

-

“Alright?” Harry says, coming back into the room after Liam leaves for work, and stealing Louis’s pot of yogurt, now sitting forgotten on the coffee table. “Is it okay to sit on this sofa, or have you two defiled it?”

“There may have been some defiling,” Louis says, stretching out and grinning at Harry. “Not as much as I was hoping for, but there you go. This is the problem with dating superheroes, they’re all moral.”

“You’re dating Flyman?” Harry says, with his mouth full of yogurt and doing the worst impression of a surprised person that Louis has ever seen, and he’s seen a lot, Styles, thank you very much. “I did not see this coming.”

“Okay, first of all, we’re not dating, just messing about,” Louis says, because he feels like that’s an important point to be made. “I just said that because it sounded better. And second of all, please call him Liam. You know that Flyman is the dumbest fucking name.”

“Hang on,” Harry says, sucking thoughtfully on his spoon – _Jesus_ , no wonder he’s got Grimmy wrapped around his little finger, that’s obscene. “Give us a minute.”

“I’m not giving you a minute to come up with a stupid innuendo,” Louis says, and Harry takes the spoon out of his mouth in order to frown at Louis and say, “I’m trying to come up with a _pun_ , it’s different.”

“Still wordplay, though, innit?” Louis says, and flaps a hand in Harry’s direction before he can protest. “Shut up, anyway, we’re talking about me and my problems.”

“Of course we are,” Harry says cheerfully. “Because I don’t have any problems. Unlike you, I have a healthy approach to relationships.”

“No, you don’t,” Louis says. “You really, really don’t. And you’re also derailing this conversation into being about you again, and I don’t appreciate it.”

“Fine, let’s talk about you and Liam, then,” Harry says, fiddling with his bandana – and where did he even get that from, Louis wants to know, because he wasn’t wearing it when he left the room. “Is that what you want?”

“No,” Louis says sulkily, then rolls his eyes when Harry makes a face at him. “Maybe. I don’t know. What if I did want to date him?”

“What if you did?” Harry says. “Is there a problem here, because I’m not following if there is.”

The problem is that Liam might not want to date _Louis_ , but Louis doesn’t want to say that. Liam is a superhero, for one, and he’s all fit and amazing and nice, and Louis’s not even very good at being a supervillain. Not really. Mostly because it’s a lot of effort and he can’t really be arsed, but the point still remains.

Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it, Harry knows him well enough that Louis doesn’t even _have_ to say that – Harry takes one look at him and visibly softens. He’s always been the emotional one, but Louis doesn’t mind that much right now, not when it means that Harry’s clambering on the sofa next to him to give him a clumsy hug.

“You know he’d be lucky to have you, Lou,” Harry says, his breath tickling Louis’s ear. He’s also a bit noisy; Harry and Niall never quite got the hang of whispering, either of them. “And I’m pretty sure he’s the one who wants to start dating, I can’t believe you haven’t noticed the way he looks at you.”

“He looks normal at me,” Louis says, muffled by Harry’s curls which seem to be escaping into his mouth. It’s uncomfortable and too warm, and Harry’s knee is digging into Louis’s leg, and he wouldn’t be anywhere else right now even if he had the power to teleport.

“He does not,” Harry says, and sits back on his heels. He’s half straddling Louis and half perched precariously on the edge of the sofa, all long legs and fluffy hair. “You don’t notice because you’re too busy thinking of something mean to say next, but he loves you.”

“Okay, steady on, lad, no one said anything about love,” Louis points out, shifting a little to get comfortable and hanging onto Harry’s wrist so neither of them fall off the sofa. “It’s more that I don’t want him getting with anyone except me.”

“I don’t think he will,” Harry says confidently, and curls up next to Louis, stealing the controller. “You’ve got nothing to worry about on that one. Rematch?”

Louis beats Harry soundly at the next three games, and feels better in spite of himself. Harry’s always been good at that, even if he’s crap at FIFA.

-

"Um," Louis says. He doesn't even follow it up with anything, but he feels like it's a pretty good reaction to have when he's opened the door and seen Liam Payne stood there. Not Flyman, either; actual _Liam_ , with no mask on and wearing a Pizza Hut uniform instead of his usual black spandex. (Louis kind of misses the spandex.) He's got a pizza box under one arm - right, yeah, because Louis did order pizza. He remembers now. He just hadn't realised that meant he'd ordered a Liam Payne as well.

It makes Louis feel better than Liam looks just as confused by this turn of events as he does, athough Louis does wish that he was wearing something other than jogging bottoms. A shirt, for example. It'd be good.

"Hi," Liam says, and takes a step forward before stopping. "You ordered a pizza?"

"I did," Louis says, because - well, he _did_. Somewhere, he's sure, Niall is laughing at him and doesn't know why. "My wallet's over there, hang on - do you want to come in?"

"I shouldn't really," Liam says, even as he's stepping over the threshold and setting the pizza box down on Louis's kitchen counter. It's all very strange.

"No, you shouldn't," Louis calls over his shoulder, as he's trying to find his wallet - it was just on the sofa a minute ago, but maybe it's fallen down the back, or in between the cushions, and it's very hard to concentrate when Liam's just standing around in his kitchen without his mask on. It's like - separation of church and state, right, where two things shouldn't ever meet - or maybe that's not the thing he's thinking of. Like a Venn diagram, maybe, Louis doesn't know, he can't think straight when Liam's stood right there. Flyman is fine, because Louis's got his mask on and he can be a prick, but Liam's just - the last time he saw Liam was when they were getting Katy back to her parents', and so that's just - it's the thing he associates with Liam.

Fucking Christ, Louis isn't making any sense at all.

"I don't like it when you agree with me," Liam says from behind him, and Louis tries to look like he's not just jumped out of his skin when Liam came into the room. "Er - are you okay?"

"Fine, fine," Louis says, in a breezy tone. "Just looking for my wallet, you know. Or enticing you in here so I can kidnap you and be the best supervillain ever, but you wouldn't even see it coming."

Liam makes a dubious face, sticking his hands in his pockets. "I've sort of got to get paid for my job," he says. "So I couldn't really leave right now, without the money. You know, if you were going to kidnap me."

"Yes, well, I'm not so don't flatter yourself," Louis says. "I was just saying that I could do that, _anyone_ could do that, because you're too trusting. You're a bit of a rubbish superhero, Liam Payne."

" _You're_ a rubbish supervillain," Liam says, ignoring the way Louis can feel himself bristling. "No, stop, I don't mean it like that - I mean - hang on." He bites his lip, looking unsure. "You looked after Katy, and you were really good with her, and I don't know if you like me or not but I liked you even when you had your mask on."

"Oh my God," Louis says. "Are you passing me a note? Is that what this is? Should I tick 'yes' if I like you back?"

"Um," Liam says, and ducks his head, the tips of his ears the same pink as his neck. Louis's fascinated, in spite of himself - and okay, maybe his heart's racing a bit, but that's just adrenaline. "If you could just tell me - there's no pressure, I'd just. I like you." He shrugs one shoulder, still not meeting Louis's eyes - Louis has seen Liam face down guns and muggers, and yet now he looks nervous. It's an ego boost, and Louis has always enjoyed a good ego boost. "I'd like to know."

"I guess you're okay," he says at last, as loftily as he can, although it's difficult to play it cool while he's also crossing the room to get his hands on Liam - without the mask this time, he gets Flyman but he gets _Liam_ , too, all of his attention, all of him, it's all _Louis's_. Liam and Flyman, they both like _Louis_ best. And yes, okay, it helps that - well, Louis might be immature sometimes but he isn't actually a child; he can man up and admit that he's been maybe pulling Liam's pigtails or whatever that shit is.

Liam smiles at him, still a little uncertain. "It's okay if you don't like me back - especially now you've seen me with the mask off, and everything. I mean, we were messing around, so – but I just want a relationship. Um. With you."

"Oh my _God_ ," Louis says again, and pulls Liam down into a kiss, mumbling, "You're so _stupid_ ," into his mouth. He pulls back to look Liam in the eyes - and around the eyes, without the mask - and says, "D'you think I become a supervillain for just _anybody_?"

“I don’t know,” Liam says. “Maybe. I don’t _know_ —” and he’s cut off, because Louis has a million better things for Liam to do with his mouth and yes, they’ve kissed before (a lot) but he’s not kissed Liam Payne as his _boyfriend_. He’s kissed Flyman and Liam, but he has to say that kissing his boyfriend is probably the best one.

He also makes a mental note not to ever say that out loud, because he knows that he won’t be able to live it down.

“Okay,” Liam says, a little breathlessly, when they’ve pulled away. Well, when _Liam’s_ pulled away – Louis had no intention of stopping any time soon. “So – I have to get back to work, but I’ll stop by after, if you’re awake? And not working? If you are – actually, can I just text you when I’m done?”

“Course you can,” Louis says, as though Liam even has to _ask_. “I have a terrible sleeping pattern, though, and I’m not working tonight so it shouldn’t be a problem.” He smirks at Liam as dirtily as he can. “ _Boyfriend_. Hey, does this mean I don’t have to pay for the pizza?”

“You still have to pay for the pizza,” Liam says, but he’s smiling. Louis’s pretty sure that he’s smiling, too, just the two of them, grinning away at each other like idiots.

“I’ll see you tonight,” Liam says finally, before he goes, and Louis holds onto it like a promise.

-

Louis isn’t exactly sure where he is.

He’d fallen asleep on the sofa with his phone in his hand, because he’d been waiting for Liam to text – or at least he’s assuming that he fell asleep. He’d been on the sofa and then he’d opened his eyes and he’d been _here_.

‘Here’, at the moment, is a cavernous room – dark and empty and echoing when Louis shouts, with shadows stretching into the corners, far enough that he can’t tell how big it is or, more worryingly, who else is here. The even _more_ worrying part of it is that Louis can’t move.

He’s strapped to something that as far as he can tell, seems to be a cross between a wooden table and an operating table; it feels rough and splintered to his hands, but the straps – and the tray of shiny looking scalpels that he can glimpse from the corner of his eye – say otherwise.

Louis’s seen enough superhero movies to have a faint idea of what’s going on here, even if he doesn’t want to admit it. He doesn’t feel scared, but he definitely feels like he _should_ be. Like maybe it’s only the surrealism of the situation and his pounding adrenaline that’s keeping him from throwing up.

And then a person moves into view, and Louis is definitely scared.

The shadows curl away from him – a hulking lump of a man wearing a striped apron. A _butcher’s apron_ , Louis’s mind helpfully fills in for him. Louis had been trying very hard not to think about that, but there you go.

"You know," Louis says, as conversationally as he can while he's tied to a table, "I'm actually a supervillain, too. We're on the same side."

The Butcher doesn't say anything, which is fair enough. What's slightly more worrying is the way that he doesn't look up from where he's sharpening some instrument of torture or other. It's the kind of set up that Louis's only seen in the movies, or in those real life behind-the-mask supervillain dramas, on the Lifetime channel or True Horror - all shining silver scalpels and scary looking things that Louis wouldn't even know what to call them. (One of them maybe reminds him of his sister's eyelash curlers, to be honest, but that's neither here nor there and Louis isn't entirely sure how he can even think things like that, at a time like _this_.)

"Honour amongst thieves," Louis adds, mouth working on autopilot. "I'm sure that's a thing."

The Butcher _does_ look up at this, frowning. "I was going to keep you alive until Flyman got here," he says, his lip curling in distaste around _Flyman_. Louis doesn't blame him, to be honest. "But I can easily kill you, if you don't shut up."

It's surprisingly not the worst threat Louis's ever had to make him shut up, but it's the most effective - at least for now. He doesn't want to die, obviously, but on the other hand it's not like he can exactly stop himself from talking when he's nervous, let alone when he's terrified for his life. He tries thinking about the meatiest part of himself, so maybe he can make a suggestion when the Butcher finally decides to start cutting him up - especially if it turns out to be sooner rather than later - but he's pretty sure it's his arse. Louis _likes_ his arse; he doesn't want it carved up like a Sunday roast.

“I don’t suppose you want to share your plan with me, while we’re waiting?” Louis tries.

It’s a mistake.

The Butcher glances at him, slow and drawn out and sharp, just long enough for Louis to feel a sickening horror in his stomach. God, why can’t he just _think_ before he speaks? His mum always said that it’d get him in trouble – she probably didn’t mean like this, admittedly, but she’s not wrong either way.

“I don’t give second chances,” the Butcher says, in what amounts to little more than a mutter – Louis can barely hear him over the sound of his own heartbeat, loud and thudding in his ears. “So I’m going to teach you a lesson for that. Hopefully you’ll learn.”

He takes his time holding tools up to the light, each one shinier and more wicked looking than the last, before settling on something – Louis doesn’t know what it is, but it looks deadly. Fuck. He feels himself compulsively clenching and unclenching his fists by his sides, feeling helpless and strapped down – especially helpless because he knows even if he _wasn’t_ strapped down, he still wouldn’t be able to do anything.

The Butcher looks like a lump of flesh that someone tried and failed to make look human, and he’s hovering over Louis with something sharp.

Louis’s not proud of it, but he passes out.

-

There’s a stinging, agonising pain in Louis’s leg. It’s what wakes him up, he’s pretty sure – his mouth is so dry that he can barely swallow, and every other sense is taken up by his leg. He tries to reach down to touch it but his hand can’t move, and then it all comes back to him; the Butcher, the warehouse, the terrifyingly sharp shiny objects.

Louis can’t see the Butcher but that doesn’t mean that he isn’t still here – he couldn’t see him when he woke up, either, and the Butcher melts into shadows like nothing Louis’s ever seen before.

The thing that Louis doesn’t doubt is that Liam’s going to save him, or at least try to – and the Butcher’s obviously expecting that as well. So he’s worried, but not about being left here to die.

He’s more worried about the pain in his leg, and what happens next, if he makes it out of here. Liam’s going to show up, but that doesn’t mean that they’ll escape.

He doesn’t know how long it is until the Butcher returns. Louis passes the time staring at the ceiling, using the pain in his leg to keep himself conscious, thinking of all the things that he’s not going to say out loud. But the Butcher _does_ return, and Louis isn’t sure what’s worse; having the Butcher around, or being alone.

He meets the Butcher’s eyes and wishes he hasn’t.

“One question,” the Butcher says, and Louis doesn’t even think about it before the words are spilling out of his mouth; “Why Flyman?” He nearly said ‘Liam’ but managed to stop himself. Even if the Butcher does know Flyman’s identity, there’s no reason to give it away.

The Butcher stares at him, long and hard, before he turns away, busying himself with his tools. “Boss’s orders.”

“Really?” Louis says, and bites his tongue. Literally.

“Thought I said not to talk anymore,” the Butcher says, sounding way too much like he’s going to enjoy Louis’s punishment. “One question. That makes two. Looks like I get a bit more of that leg o’yours.”

He turns back, wielding a large surgical needle, and Louis’s stomach sinks.

“How about this?” the Butcher growls, every word sounding like it’s dragged out of him by force. “We’ll make a deal. I’ll explain why we chose—” he pauses, “ _Flyman_ , if you don’t struggle when I use this.”

“Deal,” Louis says. _Joke’s on you_ , he thinks savagely, _I’m too scared to struggle anyway._

He regrets it almost immediately, of course, when the Butcher’s looming over him with the needle in hand – Jesus, it looks like something out of a horror movie, Louis didn’t realise that needles that vicious looking even _existed_ in real life – and jabs it into the back of Louis’s leg, just over the laceration from whatever happened earlier. Still, even though it involves repressing all of his survival instincts (Louis didn’t even know he had any, but apparently so) he manages not to struggle.

The overhead lights reflect in the Butcher’s eyes, like there’s nothing else in there.

He doesn’t know what he’s been injected with, which should scare him more than it does, really, but Louis’s just about reached the top level of fear and he’s not sure that he can go any further no matter what happens. Instead, he tries to focus – _not_ on the Butcher but on, well, anything else – and says, “So, um, Flyman?”

The moment the words are out of his mouth, he has another rush of fear. He shouldn’t have spoken, he said he wouldn’t. The Butcher looks like he’s weighing up what to do but for once things are in Louis’s favour, and he shrugs one heavy shoulder, putting the needle back on the tray.

“We need to cut the superhero problem in this city off at the source,” he says, a staccato burst of words. “Instead of going after the big ones, we need to get rid of the smaller ones. Flyman’s been making waves lately. Cut off the knees and the body can’t stand.”

Louis can’t say that he exactly follows the metaphor – it could be a shitty metaphor, or it could be the drugs that he’s relatively certain are now in his system – but the concept behind it makes sense, more or less.

The Butcher stares at him, then stretches a grin across his face. It looks unnatural.

“Don’t think I’ve forgotten about your leg.”

This time, Louis stays conscious the entire time.

-

Louis is drifting in and out of consciousness and thankful for it – seriously, no one ever said that being kidnapped would be so _boring_ – when he hears the noise, at the same time as the Butcher. He glances over but the Butcher doesn’t meet his eyes, instead intent on picking up a weapon that Louis hadn’t noticed before. A meat cleaver.

Well, no one can say that the man isn’t committed to his theme.

The Butcher doesn’t say a word to him before he melts into the shadows, seemingly scaling a wall or – more likely – slipping up a staircase. It’s amazing how such a big man can be so silent but Louis doesn’t pause to think about it. He’s more worried – okay, _terrified_ , like, shitting himself – at the thought of Liam up there, trying to face off against that.

Liam had told him once not to joke about the Butcher, and he’d been scared. Now Louis has brought the Butcher right to him, and if they both make it out of this alive, Louis is never going to joke about the Butcher again.

The drugs are still taking hold – it’s difficult for Louis to concentrate even though he desperately wants to.

There’s the sound of fighting above him before it fades; Louis focuses and sees Liam, hovering over him, with someone else next to him – someone with a matching black domino mask and a cloud of white-blonde hair.

“Liam, you’ve got yourself a friend,” Louis says, hears himself slurring the words even as he can’t do anything about it, and Liam curls his hand around Louis’s and gives the girl a worried glance.

  
"I'm Cherriebomb, love," she says and smiles at him, even as Louis's turning to Liam and saying, "See, _see_ , that's a _proper_ superhero name."

"Yeah, it is," Liam agrees quietly, stroking one hand over Louis's hair even as Louis's vision starts to fade in and out, in a way that makes him think he should be more worried than he is. It's hard to feel worried about anything when he feels like he's floating; clearly, whatever the Butcher injected him with is doing its job. The man had access to the good stuff.

He can vaguely hear Liam talking to Cherriebomb above him, catching snatches of the conversation, Liam sounding worried - "Is it okay to move him?" - and Cherriebomb - "I think we'll have to, Li."

"Hey," Louis interrupts, because that's not - _he's_ the only one allowed to know that. "He's _Flyman_ , don't - you need to use his..." He trails off, struggling to remember the start of his sentence. He's certain it had been important, though. Maybe.

There’s something that doesn’t make sense, and Louis forces words out, every one an effort.

“If you’re here, why is there fighting?”

“Blackhawk’s here,” Liam says, reaching out to push some of Louis’s hair back from his forehead. “I couldn’t fight the Butcher, not when I’d be worried about you. It’s okay, Louis. We’re going home now.”

The journey home blurs in and out, like a dream – or more like a memory of when he was young, faded and difficult to recall. He hears snatches of conversations, but he’s too out of it to make any sense of them. Louis hates feeling helpless, but he does like feeling safe – and he doesn’t know if it’s because he’s tired, or because the adrenaline’s finally run out, or because of whatever the Butcher injected him with, but he can barely keep himself conscious.

He manages, on and off, until the car pulls over and Liam’s winding one of Louis’s arms around his shoulders, holding him upright with an arm around his waist. Cherriebomb’s there too, one hip resting on the car and Louis can read her concerned expression even under the mask.

“’M fine now,” he tells her muzzily. “Li’s here, it’s fine now.”

She smiles, but it’s tight and exhausted. “I know, Louis. Liam’s going to take care of you.”

“That’s terrible,” Louis says, even as he’s dragging his feet towards the building. “Usually I take care of Liam. He doesn’t know I do, but he’s hopeless.”

“He is,” Cherriebomb agrees from behind him, and Louis looks back to see her salute them, her eyes inscrutable in the dark. “Good night, Louis.”

He thinks he says good night, but then he’s in bed, and he doesn’t know what happens after that.

-

Louis dreams of shiny tools and dark warehouses, and wakes up with a shock. He’d never believed the bits in movies where people sit upright when they wake up from a nightmare, but here he is, sat upright, so there you go. Turns out it does happen after all.

He doesn’t feel scared so much as unsettled, and he knows that there’s no chance of going back to sleep – he needs to move around, just to remind himself that he _can_ , that he’s not strapped down. It’s a new feeling and an unpleasant one, but not a life-ruining one. It’s nothing that he can’t live with.

He has another moment when he realises that he doesn’t know where he is, but then he’s not a stranger to waking up in unfamiliar rooms, and this one isn’t giving him scary vibes. Which… okay, probably isn’t the best reason to trust a room, but Louis’s had a very long week, and he’s more than allowed to trust a room for no reason if he wants to.

He’s also in bed fully clothed, which would be disappointing if it wasn’t for the fact that his memory’s a bit hazy right now, so it’s easy enough to crawl out of bed and – ouch, okay, there are two long wounds on the back of one of his legs, right where Louis can’t see it without twisting around in front of a mirror.

Those will need to be worried about later, but right now Louis finds a pair of trackie bottoms on the floor and drags them on once he’s managed to wriggle out of his jeans and t-shirt. There’s a light glowing from one of the rooms, flickering on and off like a television set, and he’s not even surprised to turn the corner and see Liam curled up and asleep on the sofa.

Louis pads over to the TV to turn it off, and he hears Liam sitting up behind him.

“You know,” he says, “when you take someone back to yours, you’re supposed to let them know.”

When he turns around Liam is biting his lip, and there are shadows under his eyes that aren’t just because of the light. He looks older and tired, and Louis doesn’t have to think about it before he’s taken two steps over to the sofa and pulled Liam closer to him.

“Hey, it’s okay,” he says softly, because Liam’s shoulders are tense and he looks one wrong word away from a crying fit. “I’m okay, Liam.”

“I should’ve told you,” Liam says. “But I thought you’d know where you were, and I didn’t think you’d wake up. I don’t – I’ve never saved someone like that before, it’s always been little things.” He swallows, hard. “I didn’t feel like a hero. I just felt really scared, and – really guilty.”

Well. ‘Guilty’ isn’t a good sign.

Louis opens his mouth to argue, or something, but Liam looks at him – _really_ looks at him – and it’s his turn to frown.

“You should be in bed,” he says accusatorily. “You’ve had trauma today.”

Louis could argue with _that_ , too, but it’s probably easier just to let Liam manhandle him back into what he now realises is Liam’s room. Liam looks like he’s about to tuck Louis in for good measure, so Louis gets into the bed maybe a bit more hurriedly than he usually would. He might be sort of dating Liam or whatever, but he’s an adult, and he really doesn’t need to be tucked in.

Liam doesn’t leave once Louis is in bed, duvet pulled up to his chin and propped up on a mound of pillows (Liam seems to really like having a lot of pillows). Instead, he makes a face, like he’s about to say something but can’t quite get the words out.

Then he says, in a rush, “I texted Harry the other night, by the way, so he knows that you’re here and safe but I didn’t tell him the details, I didn’t think he needed worrying. He’s the one who was worried when he got in and you weren’t there.”

“Oookay,” Louis says. “I mean, I’m glad Harry isn’t worried, but I have to say that’s not where I thought this was going.”

“Um,” Liam says, shifts from foot to foot and says, “Harry wasn’t worried, but I was.”

Louis has a bad feeling about this.

"Please tell me this isn't a lead-up to a conversation where you break up with me, 'cause you're trying to be all noble," he says, and glares at Liam for good measure.

Liam, who is alternately opening and closing his hands into fists where they hang at his sides, glares back. "I didn't know we were together. I mean. Officially."

"If we weren't before, then we definitely are now," Louis says. "Or do you think that I let myself get chopped up by the Butcher for just about anybody?"

"You - didn't get chopped up, he didn't hurt you," Liam says uncertainly. "Did he?"

Oops. Louis didn’t realise that he hadn’t told Liam about the nice shiny new scars he’s going to have on the back of his leg. Still, no point worrying him now.

"Well, no, but that's not the point. The point is that you don't get to be all self-serving and go all Spiderman 'wah wah I can't let myself be with someone in case they get hurt'," Louis says. He's still glaring, in the hope that he can somehow intimidate Liam into not breaking up with him. Maybe he just shouldn't have told Liam that they were actually together, because then Liam wouldn't be able to.

"Oh," Liam says, which doesn't do much to reassure Louis on the not-breaking-up-with-him front. "I didn't think of that, actually. I mean, I did, but I didn't think that you'd let me."

"Good," Louis says. "Because I wouldn't. So that sorts _that_ out."

He’s going to argue some more but he’s really tired – it’s been a long day, and he doesn’t think that whatever the Butcher gave him is fully out of his system. His leg still hurts in a dull ache (okay, he should probably tell someone about that at some point) and he can feel his eyes drifting shut even now.

“I’ll let you get some sleep,” Liam says, and Louis doesn’t even think about it before holding out his hand to Liam.

“I hope you’re not going to let a dangerous supervillain stay in your flat on his own, Li,” he says, lacking any kind of real force behind the words. “I could just be pretending to be sleepy and then I’ll rain down my destruction on your bedroom.”

Liam huffs out a sigh, but it sounds fond, and barely a second’s passed before he’s slipping under the covers next to Louis. “I don’t think there’s any real destruction you could do in my room,” he starts, but Louis’s already curled up next to him and he misses the rest of Liam’s sentence as sleep takes over him.

-

Liam’s not there in the morning, and Louis maybe has a minor heart attack until he hears noises in the living room – TV, and Liam’s low laugh. He flops back down and pushes his hands through his hair, waiting until his heart stops racing. It’s fine. He’s safe, and _Liam’s_ safe, and he should’ve expected this from dating a superhero.

Liam saved him, and Louis’s going to take self defence lessons, and Louis really isn’t that bothered. His biggest issue is the fact that he’d woken up about five times in the night. Nightmares he can deal with, but a lack of sleep just makes him cranky.

He swings his feet out of bed, noting Liam’s Flyman costume hung up on a hanger on the wardrobe door, and resisting the urge to try it on – it’d probably just be embarrassing when it was too big in the shoulders. Instead, he finds one of Liam’s Batman t-shirts (because of _course_ he has more than one, Louis notices fondly) and pulls that on instead before padding out to the living room.

Liam’s watching Saturday morning cartoons. Louis’s pretty sure that he should not find that as endearing as he does. He deals with it by stealing Liam’s bowl of cereal and joining him.

“I can’t believe you watch cartoons,” he says, for lack of anything else – mostly because Liam looks like he’s thinking hard, and that’s never good. “How old are you again?”

“That’s not the point,” Liam says, although it is, because Louis just made the point. Liam obviously doesn’t understand how conversations work.

“They’re not even superhero cartoons,” he says instead, and yes, maybe he’s desperately trying to avoid whatever conversation Liam is trying to have, but he’s well within his rights to do that.

Unfortunately, Liam waits until Louis’s just taken a big mouthful of cornflakes to start speaking.

“Okay,” Liam says, “here’s the thing. I’ve been thinking and, like – you were wrong, I’d never ask you to stop – to not – I mean.” He stops, frustrated, and it takes everything in Louis not to interrupt. He’s so, so tempted, but Liam is definitely making a ‘I need to do this myself’ face. Which wouldn’t usually stop Louis, to be honest, but he’s still a little scared that Liam might change his mind about all this and Louis doesn’t want to give him a reason to if he can help it.

Liam doesn’t say anything for more than a few minutes, though, and so Louis decides it’s safe if he bumps his shoulder against Liam, smiling at him. “Use your words, Liam.”

“Right,” Liam says, sounding more decisive, and is he actually squaring his shoulders? “I want to be in a relationship with you, because I really like you, and I want it more than – er, not more than I want you to get hurt, but I’m not going to give it up so you don’t.” He stops again, and Louis rolls his eyes, bumping his shoulder a little harder this time. “Anyway, I’ll just give up superhero-ing instead.”

“Oh my _God_ ,” Louis says, and flops down on the sofa, rubbing his eyes with his hands. “Liam, no.”

Liam frowns at him, his eyebrows drawing together. “Why not? I can if I want. And then you won’t get hurt and I still get to date you.”

“And do what?” Louis asks. “Keep on delivering pizza? Shut up, Flyman, you love saving people and all that shit. I’m not having you being unhappy for my sake. Besides, it’s not like I’m going to stop being a supervillain – and if you even think about asking me to be your sidekick, I’ll – I’ll do something really mean, and then you’ll be sorry.”

It’s Liam’s turn to roll his eyes, but he sits down beside Louis on the sofa anyway. “But I meant it when I said I don’t want you to get hurt,” he says. “When the Butcher had you – Lou, you don’t know what it was like. I’d easy give up superhero-ing, if it meant that never happened again.”

“That’s because you’re stupid,” Louis says. “You saved me, didn’t you?”

“With Perrie’s help,” Liam says, then flushes. “I mean. Cherriebomb, not Perrie.”

“You’re terrible at keeping superhero identities secret,” Louis says, then, “Wait, Cherriebomb is _Perrie_? Oh, like – like Perriebomb, Cherrybomb, I get it. That’s clever, why couldn’t _you_ think up something clever like that?”

“Don’t distract me,” Liam says firmly. “It’s not funny, Louis.”

“ _You’re_ not funny,” Louis says, which is true, but also he’s trying to buy time while he thinks of a way out of this. There doesn’t seem to be one, but there has to be. “My point was that you and our Perrie saved me, and you can do it again, if you have to.”

“What if—”

“ _And_ ,” Louis continues, talking loudly over Liam, “I’ll take, like, self defence lessons. And get a gun.”

“No,” Liam says immediately. “You’re not getting a gun, you’d drop it on your foot and accidentally shoot us all.”

“Fine,” Louis says. It’s not like Liam would have to know if he got a gun, anyway. “Well, I will take self defence. Wax on, wax off.” Liam looks blank. “You’ve never seen The Karate Kid? Liam, what is _wrong_ with you?”

“Nothing,” Liam says. “But I was thinking – this is really stupid,” he adds quickly, “but what if you moved in with me? I know it’s really soon, sorry, but I’d like it if – not that I want to know where you are all the time, but it’d be nice. If I did. Know where you are all the time.”

It’s a bad idea. They’ve been hooking up for a few weeks and officially dating for a day, and if there’s anything that could count as moving too fast, it would be this. It’s definitely a bad idea, and that alone means that Louis doesn’t even have to think about it.

“Yes,” he says, and the look on Liam’s face makes it worth it.

-

“You’re mental!” Niall shouts, and slings his arm around Louis’s shoulder, grinning madly. He’s already incredibly drunk and the party’s only been going for an hour or two. For all Niall likes to go on about his Irish genes meaning he can drink everyone under the table, he’s one of the biggest lightweights that Louis knows.

“I am!” Louis shouts back – because it’s not like _he’s_ sober – and manages to put his arm around Niall without the two of them falling over entirely (although it’s close to it). “Why am I?”

“Because you’re moving in with _Liam_!” Niall shouts back, and cracks up laughing. “You’ve known him for, like, a week, mate, and you spent most of that time being an arse to him.”

“Liam knows more about my arse than you do,” Louis says, and pokes Niall in the side as he squirms away from him, still laughing. “Anyway, shut up, you woke up on the roof the other week.”

“I still think Perrie put me there because she was annoyed,” Niall says, despite the fact that Perrie’s power is explosions, and there’s literally no way she’d have cared enough to drop Niall off on the roof. Still, if that’s what he wants to tell himself.

Louis’s about to say something when someone takes Niall’s arm, drawing him away – it’s Zayn, who winks at him over Niall’s head. “Let’s go get some water, Nialler,” he says, and Louis’s a little relieved in spite of himself – he’s drunk but not drunk enough. There are a lot of people, and it’s just a bit much right now. That’s all.

It’s easy enough to escape onto the roof and it reminds him of when he put all of Liam’s furniture up there, too, which is nice. It’s even nicer when someone lands next to him.

“You do know you can use the stairs,” Louis says, without even having to look – there’s only one superhero who’d fly onto _this_ roof right now. “You’re just being a showy twat.”

“Takes one to know one,” Liam says, and wraps his arm around Louis, resting his head on Louis’s shoulder. He’s been clingier since the Butcher – but then, that could just be because they’re officially together now. Not everything’s about the Butcher, Louis reminds himself. He refuses to divide his life into Before and After the Butcher.

“Niall told me that we’re mental for moving in together,” Louis says after a moment, and Liam huffs a laugh into his shoulder.

“He told me that, too.” It’s nice up here, Louis thinks. Quiet. “Do you think he’s right? Not that I do. I just thought, you’re not changing your mind, are you?”

“ _No_ ,” Louis says, in his best you’re-an-idiot voice. And then, because _he’s_ just as much of an idiot, “You’ll have to put up with my nightmares, though.”

Liam’s arms tighten around him, but that’s the only indication that he’s heard him.

“Well, not nightmares exactly,” Louis says quickly. “I mean, yes, they’re nightmares, but I don’t wake up screaming or anything. I just need to get up in the night sometimes. And it’ll be nice, having you next to me, when I wake up. Don’t worry, Liam, I won’t bother you or anything.”

Liam says, “Is this because of the Butcher?” He doesn’t want for an answer, though; letting go of Louis and pulling him over to the sofa that they left up there instead, too lazy to move it back down with the rest of Liam’s stuff. Louis is, as always, struck by how easy it is to just flop on top of Liam – to throw his legs over him and push his face into Liam’s neck.

“You know I won’t let anything happen to you?” Liam says eventually. “Blackhawk caught the Butcher, he’s not – he can’t get to us.”

“Yeah,” Louis says, and then, “And maybe it’ll help if I lock the door next time.”

“You didn’t lock the door,” Liam says, and Louis shrugs.

“I don’t always when I’m home alone.”

“Well,” Liam says. “This isn’t really making me worry about you _less_.”

“I’m not going to say that I won’t let anything bad happen to you, because I can’t anyway, but I would if I could,” Louis says, because he’s a little drunk and that means it’s always easier to talk about his feelings. “But the thing is – no, Liam, you don’t get it, the thing is that – and this sounds cheesy as shit, okay, but go with it – the thing is that even if bad stuff happens, it’s okay, if we’re, you know.” He stops, shrugging a shoulder. “Together. And that.”

Liam doesn’t say anything for a moment and Louis slumps a bit further down on the sofa. It sounded even worse out loud than it had in his head but he couldn’t think of a better way to say it; he doesn’t really mind as much if bad stuff happens which, if he’s dating a superhero, it’s going to – as long as he gets to come home to Liam. Which is actually probably a better way to say it, but it’s too late and he’s said it now and he’s not going to dig himself a hole trying to explain.

Liam still hasn’t said anything, and Louis risks looking at him. Liam’s eyes are all big and watery, because he’s an actual romantic puppy, oh my God, and he grabs Louis’s face with both hands.

“I love you, Lou,” he says, eyes fixed on Louis’s, all intent and serious and making eye contact _on purpose_ , like it’s something that he’s purposely doing. “I don’t mind if you don’t say it back or you’re not ready, I just wanted you to know.”

“Oh my God,” Louis says, because his internal monologue is running a little slow here. “Oh my God, Liam, you big dumb idiot, _of course_ I love you too,” and he had some other things he was going to say here too, but he’s cut off by Liam kissing him.

It’s nothing like their first kiss, which hurt and left Louis’s mouth sore and tender for days (although they’re still going to have kisses like that; Louis’s going to make sure of it). It’s the kind of kiss that two people can have when they know each other well, when they know how they feel about each other.

“We should probably get back to the party,” Liam says, when he’s finally let go of Louis’s face, sounding reluctant. “I don’t think we’re going to get much alone time tonight.”

“Yep,” Louis agrees, but pulls Liam back in again regardless. It’s at least twenty minutes until they make it back to the party and they’re greeted by Harry’s grinning face when they do, shooting them a thumbs up that makes it obvious to everyone there just exactly what they’ve been doing.

“Wish you could teleport?” Liam whispers in Louis’s ear, but Louis licks a stripe up his neck before saying no. Surrounded by his friends at a party with great booze, and most of all he’s got _Liam_?

Louis never wants to be anywhere but here.

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: references to flaying, one character has two deep wounds to the back of his leg and is injected with an unknown drug.


End file.
